Part of the Team
by Crescent Moon Dancer
Summary: Tony overhears the conversation between Natasha and Bruce at the Barton's house, and, backed by Steve and Clint, sets out to change their minds about disappearing. (Alternate end to the scene from the movie.)
"In the red room, where I was trained - where I was _raised -_ they have a graduation ceremony... They sterilize you. It's efficient." Natasha paused, swallowing hard as the memory sent a jab of painful regret through her heart. "One less thing to worry about. The one thing that might matter more than...a mission." She paused again, trying to regain control as her voice threatened to break. "Makes everything easier. Even killing." Bruce was staring at her in a kind of horrified, sympathetic fascination, unable to find anything to say, and she met his eyes, her voice definitely unsteady. "You still think you're the only monster on the team?"

A moment of silence stretched between them, and then the scientist spoke, his voice almost as extinguished as hers. "So we just...disappear?"

"No."

They both started, and Bruce's eyes traveled over her shoulder as she turned. Tony was leaning against the door frame, arms crossed, staring at them both with a face perfectly devoid of expression. Levering himself off the wall, he advanced into the room, standing between them.

"You're not going anywhere," he stated, his tone brooking no argument.

"Tony," Bruce began, but the billionaire playboy held up a hand, forestalling him.

"No," he repeated, a little louder than before. "Don't even bother."

"Tony, will you shut up and listen for once?" the doctor tried again, but Stark shook his head.

"No, _you_ shut up and listen," he ordered. He stomped around the room a little bit, in that annoyingly dramatic Tony Stark way he had, before coming to a stop between them again. "You two leave the team - _disappear,_ as you so _eloquently_ put it - and we're left with only four sixths of a team."

"You know that reduces down to two thirds, right?" Steve entered the room, Clint close behind him. They both looked as sober as Tony, though the faintest twinkle of humor flickered briefly in the captain's blue eyes. The resident genius threw him an irritated look.

"Do you mind? Giving a motivational speech/lecture here." Cap nodded, and Tony turned back to the two miscreants.

"Look, I know things seem grim right now, especially in light of Banner's...accident. And yes, we may be fugitives hiding out in our sneaky friend's family home," he cut a sideways glance at Clint, who looked, for his part, singularly unrepentant, "because of it. But we're still a _team._ "

"You don't get it, Tony." Natasha ran her fingers through her red hair - an uncharacteristically nervous gesture on her part. "Bruce and I - we're different. We're not...we're both..."

"Monsters?" Stark crossed his arms again, staring down his nose at the woman. "I don't know if you've noticed, but I kind of set a crazy mechanical killer on the loose. That's why we're in this mess. And have you forgotten? It's physically hurt us, something the two of you never did."

"That's not true." The doctor's voice was quiet, but surprisingly hard, and he looked up, meeting his science-buddy's eyes squarely. "In case you didn't notice, remember that time on the helicarrier, when the Other Guy showed up and wrecked the thing, almost killing Nat - almost killing all of you?"

Clint spoke up from his position by the doorway. "In case _you_ didn't notice, I was the one who led the attack that caused you to Hulk-out in the first place. It's as much my fault as yours."

"That's different." Banner looked agitated, and ran his fingers through his wet hair, imitating Natasha's movement. "Loki had taken over your mind, you couldn't control your actions."

"Exactly." Barton came farther into the room, but stopped a few feet away from the scientist. If the other man felt like he was being cornered and ganged up on, things would get very not pretty, very quickly. "I had no control. And you have no control over the Hulk. It's not your fault that you have that problem - just like it wasn't my fault that I attacked the helicarrier." Bruce still looked unconvinced, and Tony sighed noisily.

"Loki was using you both in that instance," he told the curly-haired man. "He was just a little more blatant about using Barton."

There was a moment of quiet as Banner considered this. Then-

"What about me?" All eyes turned to Natasha, who was looking at the billionaire with pursed lips, daring him to contradict whatever she was about to say. "Nobody was controlling me. When I got sent on those missions, I killed people. I knew what I was doing, I was in my right mind, and I killed them." Her voice cracked on the last two words, but she managed to keep the tears at bay, even as they threatened to spill over and disgrace her stoic dignity.

Stark sighed silently and turned to face her fully, his tone softening. "We've all done stuff we regret," he said. "We've all made mistakes. Remember Ultron? The big metal bad guy we're fighting right now? I'm not exactly proud of that. Of him. Thor...he almost destroyed an entire realm before his dad got ticked at him and kicked him off the planet. And Rogers..." He paused, glancing at Steve, who quirked an eyebrow and waited for him to finish. "Okay, so Rogers is still _infuriatingly_ perfect and has yet to make a single foible." He glowered at the super soldier, who stared back at him blandly, before looking the Black Widow in the eyes. "Doesn't that make the rest of us - the good captain excepted, of course - as much of monsters as you and Banner?"

Another minute of silence passed before Natasha spoke again. "It's just not the same. You- you have no idea what my life was like. What I've done."

Tony backed up a few paces, smacking a palm to his forehead. He was quickly losing his temper, and decided he was going to spill a secret he thought he'd take to the grave. Doubtless he'd regret it later, but right now he was too fed up to care.

"And you think running off into the blue is going to help?" he demanded. "You and Banner, you think you can just run from what you've done? Or what you think you've done? It doesn't matter where you go, or who you leave behind, you can't run from the past. It'll still be there with you. You accept it and get over it and get on with life." Both the doctor and the assassin opened their mouths to answer, but Tony wasn't finished yet. "You know what, you're not the only ones that...that witch got a hold of. Did you know she got to me before she hit the rest of you?" He was beginning to breathe heavily, and Steve vaguely registered relief that Iron Man didn't have the same problem as Bruce. "You know what she made me see? You. All of you. You were all dead, except Steve, who died right in front of my face." He closed his eyes, locking his jaw as Cap's weak, broken voice echoed eerily in his head.

 _"You...could have...saved...us. Why didn't...you do more?"_

Stark gritted his teeth a moment, then opened his eyes and met Romanoff's horrified gaze. "You leave the team," he said, enunciating each word slowly and carefully, "and you might as well see the same thing. All of us dead at your feet." He turned his dark eyes to Banner, his face grim and completely unsympathetic. "Same goes for you. If it weren't for you, I'd be a smoking pile of metal and a little smear on some hacked-up street in Manhattan. And if it weren't for _you,_ " he whirled back to the redhead, "nobody would be able to calm _him_ down, and we'd never be able to keep track of him. He'd wander around, coming and going periodically." He paused, considering. "Like a pimple."

Behind him, Clint snorted with laughter, and even Natasha cracked a faint smile. Steve raised his eyebrow again, and Bruce got that quiet, meekly offended look he adopted when insulted.

"Flattering," he remarked dryly. Tony rounded on him again.

"I'm not really in the mood to be flattering," he said, his voice full of soft, carefully controlled anger. "In fact, I'm getting really tired of you moping around, pretending to be worthless and acting like you're the only one with personal problems all the time. You're part of this team, for better or worse, and you're an important part of it, too. I'm not the guy to get sentimental - and I can't believe I'm saying this - but we all have our roles to play." Stark looked around at them all, his eyes smouldering slightly. "Maybe the Avengers can be expanded, but not a single one of us can be replaced." He glared at Banner and Natasha impartially. "Get that through your thick heads, or so help me I'll put on my suit and beat your sorry asses into the ground."

Another silence. The two would-be deserters looked ashamed of themselves, Barton looked impressed and faintly astonished, and Steve looked at Tony reprovingly.

"Language."


End file.
